Paul's Defeat by an Bruised Girl
by WonderlandMik
Summary: Kaylyn Brooke is a new resident at Kingdom Hospital, the ghosts of Mary and Paul still linger and are ready to wage war against eachother. Can Kaylyn stop them before it's too late?
1. Kaylyn awakes

My body felt broken, searing pain shot through my arms as I tried to push myself up off the ground. I shrieked and fell back on the cold, stone floor. I cried for a short while and decided to try again, anything was better that lying on the ground. The cold was seeping through the thin blue gown I was wearing. I pushed up once again and found that my arms didn't hurt as much.

Standing up I could see that the room was like a morgue from those crime shows I watch all the time. It was dark but a faint blue light was coming from across the hallway. I walked over to the double doors and pushed them open slightly. It seemed like I was in an abandoned hospital, cobwebs and dust coated the lockers and doorways.

Just as I reached another door a voice came out of nowhere, "Well, what do we have here? Another short timer, huh, this place is filled with them." I turned around to see a boy who looked about fifteen years old, but whose eyes and speech made him much older. He had dark, curly hair that just reached his collar and wore clothes from the 1930's. He looked me over and smirked. I finally realized what I was wearing, a blue polka dotted hospital gown that reached my knees. Luckily it wasn't open backed. I was also bare footed and my hair was back to the way it used to be, a black curly mess that cascaded down to my waist.

I glared at him but his smile only grew bigger. Something about him seemed incredibly dangerous. I tried to move away, but failed when I tripped over nothing and landed ungracefully on my bottom. He laughed so hard that it seemed like he would never stop. Of course he did and he went over to me. By that time I was already on my feet. He grabbed my arms and all of a sudden the pain was back. It hurt so much that I couldn't even scream. In my moment of confusion the boy picked me up and flung me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. I was too weak to protest.

All I heard before I succumbed to the darkness invading my mind was the boy saying,"Oh, by the way, my name's Paul."

Waking up strapped to a table was not something that normally happened to me, so I kind of freaked out. Paul rushed into the room just as I snapped of the restraints with my new found strength. He looked shocked to say the least, even more so when I jumped off the table and made a mad dash for the door. His arms wrapped around my waist and locked my arms to my chest. I was bit to close for comfort, I could feel his breath on my face. I shivered. "You need to stay here." he said quitely. I saw no other option so I screamed really loudly. It was such a shock that he let go instantly.

I raced out of the dark and soon found myself in an operating room, standing near a middle aged doctor. "Another cross." He muttered and then turned away giving me full view of the body, if you could even call it that. It was a girl, no older than me. I started to notice more similarities, tall stature, mid weight, and a shock of bottle blond curly hair. I heard a low keening wail, it took me a few seconds to realize that it was coming from me. This was my body! Or what was left of it.

That's when it dawned on me...I was dead. Spots danced in front of my eyes and I fainted straight away into Paul's waiting arms, who had snuck up behind me.


	2. Kaylyn's discovery

Paul snickered as he lifted me up bridal style and carried me out of the room, "Guess you didn't know." He said.

"Jerk." I mumbled. He just ignored me and brought me back to the room where I'd been strapped to the table. I groaned and Paul ever so gently dropped me on the table and backed away. I looked up at him, confusion clouding my face. The straps that had been on the table had miraculously disappeared.

"Aren't you going to tie me down?" A second later I realized how stupid I sounded and proceeded to clamp my mouth shut. Paul looked at my bruised and broken form with something like pity, but not quite.

"No one deserves to be chained like an animal."There seemed to be a whole other story behind his sudden…for lack of a better word 'kindness'. Immediately his expression went blank and he told me to wait here and that he'd be right back.

"Oh and if you try to escape, you'll end up just like that guy." He pointed to a man I hadn't noticed before, he was laying on a table across from us. Covered in blood, there wasn't a single space on his body that didn't have a tiny needle sticking out.

'Acupuncture gone wrong,' I thought, shying away from the corpse. I backed up into Paul who grabbed my arms and pulled me against him. My face heated up when his hand slid under my chin and he forced me to look into his cold eyes.

"This is what happens when you get on the "Good Doctor's" bad side. All that man did was wander a smidge too far and look what he got, a lethal dose of "Dr. Gottreich"." Paul grimaced. Whoever this doctor was he had certainly hurt a lot of people including Paul. Why did that matter to me? I have no idea.

Once Paul left I did what any sensible person would do…I ran away. Of course I had no idea that this would be what he expected and that he would be waiting outside the room for me. So I did something really stupid, I kicked him in the crotch and ran. I could still hear him gasping in pain as I made my escape.

About an hour later I was good and lost. I had come into the realm of the living once again but there was no one who could see me.

A nurse directly in front of me shrieked when she was a little blood and fainted. Her body passed right through mine. I felt tears come to my eyes, I couldn't feel anything.

"What am I?"I wondered out loud. My answer came when a small child's hand gripped mine.

"You're one of us now" The voice came from a monstrous anteater sitting on its haunches next to a girl half its size. Smiling sweetly the little girl led me into a vacant room with a few chairs. She sat me down on one.

"My name is Mary," she smiled sadly,"Welcome to Kingdom Hospital."


	3. The explanation

I don't know how long Mary and I sat talking. It seemed like forever, but she explained that things in this dimension (she called it Swedenborg and Space) are not the same as that in the real world. For one thing the human's can't see us and time works in several different ways. She listed all the ways but I told her that it didn't really matter to me and I would not be able to keep them all straight.

Mary told me about the mill fire and how she died. She also told me all about Paul. When I told her that he was the one who found me she patted me on the back and told me that I would be safe with her and the anteater, Antibus. He later told me that his real name was Anubis, but Mary couldn't pronounce it when she was alive, so it stuck with her when she died. She also said that he sometimes would turn into a human form and because in her mind she wanted Paul to be nice to her Antibus took on his appearance.

Mary and I sat in comfortable silence and watched the nurses and patients move around. Finally Antibus said," Kaylyn, I'm going to need your help. Paul is getting more restless each day. He and the doctor are planning to cross over into the living world tonight. I'm sorry to ask you this, considering all that you've been through, but I need your help to get them to where they need to go." He pointed a paw to the ground and I understood immediately. "There was a reason you died and I think that it may be to help us all." He gestured to the people surrounding us, indicating that he meant the living too.

"I'd be glad to help," I said," But I have no idea what I can do. I've seen Paul walk through walls, am I supposed to be able to do that?" My voice cracked. Just thinking about my new "life" here made me even more panicked.

Both of them looked at me like I was insane. "You don't have to worry about that, it usually takes a lot of practice but I think it may be a whole lot easier for you. See?" said Mary as she shoved me right through the nearest wall. The room I fazed into was a patient's room. The walls were a baby blue hue and everything looked squeaky clean. A woman was looking at her husband who was in bad shape. He opened his eyes and looked right at me.

"That's Peter," said Mary, "He can see us." I smiled at him and he tiredly closed his eyes. " Kaylyn we need your help more than anything, you're the only one we know that can pick up being a ghost that fast. I didn't tell you before but most newly deceased can't walk through walls on their first try, but I had a feeling about you and it looks like I was right!"

_Great now I'm some kind of freak! _I thought to myself as I got up from the ground. I was only a 15 year old girl, not some superhero. I looked down at Mary; her tiny childish face looked up at me with hope.

"Well, I'll try to help you guys, I just don't know what I can do that you can't." I said. But Mary just grinned and she grabbing my arm pulling me along with amazing strength for a 9 year old. Seeing the question in my eyes she smiled mysteriously and said,

" It's a ghost thing. And don't worry about how you can help us, I'm sure that your powers will make themselves known soon." We walked down the hall together. What an odd threesome we made, a teenager, a little girl, and a giant anteater, off to save our world.


	4. Kaylyn's Resolve

Life, or rather limbo, at Kingdom Hospital quickly became the norm for me. Accepting my death for what it was, a young life tragically cut short, helped me adjust to being a ghost. I was able to walk through walls without even flinching now and I was getting better at making myself manifest in reflective surfaces, like windows and mirrors. I was actually quite enjoying my time with Mary and Anubis. They were great teachers and friends. Even the occasional sightings of Paul and the Doctor were becoming less scary. It seemed that they knew not to mess with me when Anubis was around. When he was not, however, was a completely different story.

One day Mary and I were on our way to visit Mona Klingerman, the girl was quite messed up but we liked to watch over her when her mom was away. The children's ward was our favorite place because some of the children could see us. Luckily they were able to play it off like we were their imaginary friends so their parents didn't get very concerned. The hallway seemed a little off though; we noticed it the second we walked in. It was cold. It never got cold in the children's ward; it was always like eighty degrees.

Workmen huddled around a thermostat scratching their heads. It read eighty but it felt more like fifty. I looked to Mary, but her eyes were fixed to a point down the hall. I followed her gaze and was met with stormy green eyes, Paul. As always the Doctor was right beside them. Remembering our last encounter I shivered a little, he probably hadn't appreciated that kick.

"Looks like you are missing a giant hairy menace, huh?" said Paul, grinning a bit evilly. He took a step towards us and we took one back. He chuckled. "Not so tough now, are you?" he sneered. I shook myself and stepped in front of Mary, no more running. He seemed perplexed or just stunned because he arched an eyebrow and stopped advancing.

"Leave… please," I added weakly. Gathering my resolve I spoke again," You're hurting them." I gestured to the shivering children and people in the ward. Paul looked at me like I'd grown another head. He spun to look at the Doctor, who was glaring at me.

"Well, isn't this an interesting turn of events. The beast picks up a stray that turns out to have back bone." Dr. Gottreich said, "It's a good thing we have better things to do right now or you would be sorely outmatched." Suddenly the Doctor's "creations" appeared, the men and women who had been subject to his torture in the afterlife. They were sad, soulless looking things with disfiguring burns and mutations. My heart broke as I saw children amongst them.

I grabbed Mary's hand and marched us out of the ward and into the ambulance entry. I knew the evil pair wouldn't follow us because they didn't like to be near those who still had a chance to live. Just then Ollie and Danny came in rushing a woman into the ER. "Those two work so hard," Mary commented.

"Yeah." I said. I must have looked very downtrodden because Mary led me to the seats near the security office. Blondie, Otto's German shepherd came to greet us. While petting him, I glanced up at Otto, who appeared to be sleeping on the job again. I ruffled the papers on his desk and he shot up from his desk, muttering "That's the third time this week." Mary laughed and complimented my growing abilities. She turned serious after a moment.

"You know that Paul's not all bad, right?" Mary whispered, eyeing her nervously I shrugged, not liking where this was going at all. "He was once just a teenager, like you. His parents sold him off to Dr. Gottreich when he was just 13. He lived with him for two years before the doctor killed him during one of his experiments. His eyes weren't always green." She said dismally. Startled, I peeked at her face, she looked so sad.

"Did you know him, you know, before?" I asked.

"Yes, I met him a few weeks before I died. He was the nicest person. I stuck around because of him. I didn't want him to be lonely." Her childish voice carried. I smiled at her and gave her a hug, deciding then and there that if I could save Paul I would.


End file.
